It really wasn’t a long fight. I mean, they were just a bunch of nasty little goblins. The whole thing took less than five minutes.

Sorry, I know we’re usually known for our willingness to go into overly descriptive detail of how we violently kill people around here. Y’know, awesome stuff like

ALL

Sounds cool, right? It should, that’s our usual product! It's in demand!

But these guys weren’t worth any of that effort. They really weren’t.

Not only were Fog Goblins disgusting little bastards, but they sucked at fighting too!

It was like beating up a classroom of angry kindergarteners. Which I’ve done before. They wouldn’t share the Legos! But somehow this was even worse. It just didn’t feel like the epic clash suitable for the finale of this rollicking story. Sure, we’d saved a bunch of innocents and all that, but it had all been so easy that it wasn’t…

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a sadist. I’m a very happy sadist! Tormenting those weaker than myself, that was just ! I loved doing that! Maybe it was just the quality of these victims? See, these fog goblins were even dumber than my duplicates used to be. But they weren’t dumb in an amusing sort of way. It was more like they were…oh, how do I say this without offending someone? They just weren’t all there, mentally. In a way that invited pity, not contempt.

Yeah. That’s it exactly, what I felt bad about! Who could possibly enjoy an experience like this? It was just wrong!

Jesus. I can be mean sometimes, but I’m not mean!

“Libby, are you these guys are a threat?” I asked her. “Something feels really off.”

“How do you mean?” she asked me.

“Well, you said fog goblins are like, evil pillaging bastards, right? And they’re smart enough to understand human language, yeah? But let me ask you this…”

I grabbed one of the nasty little things by its foot and held it upside down, while it yelled and spat and bit at me. Not that it would hurt if it did, since its mouth was basically all gums.

“Does look like a wicked little monster to you?”

Libby stared at it thoughtfully for a few moments. “You know…it really doesn’t. It kind of looks like a helpless little goober. I really can’t picture those girls being in danger if they fell into the clutches of these sad little things."

"Yeeeeah," I murmured. Then I cast [Appraisal].

“Huh. Hey, Libby?”

“Yes?”

“What the Hell is a ” I asked her.

__

“Oh my God this coffee is incredible,” I said as I sipped deeply from a cup of this heavenly brew.

“I know, right?” Libby said. “The aroma and flavor are like nothing I’ve ever had before! Is this coffee, or is this joy It’s really changing my opinion of these little angels!”

She stroked one of the bean goblins under its chin as she spoke. He gurgled happily and pounded his foot on the floor like an excited puppy.

So, as it turns out, I had just been chopping away at an enslaved tribe of lesser goblins known as bean goblins!

Heh. Whoops.magic

The fog goblins were all holed up in their den planning out their wicked fog goblin shenanigans. These beanies were just a bunch of lesser saps that had been conscripted to guard the FG nest. They were disposable soldiers, easily replaced since bean goblins reproduced extremely quickly. I’d seen it right before my very eyes. One of them bent over and sort of vomited up a clutch of tiny little goblins, then wandered away, utterly disinterested.

Ha, gross.

I’d just assumed they were fog goblins because I hadn’t appraised them first, which was my bad. Seriously, totally on me. Luckily, bean goblins are barely sapient and don’t hold any grudges. As soon as I stopped showing aggression towards them, they did the same for me.

Yeah, bean goblins are harmless single-gendered vegetarians. The only thing they were really known for was brewing extremely good coffee.

Oh, mama, it was good!

“Oh GOD, Max this coffee is fucking good!” Libby said with enthusiasm.

See?

“Libby…Libby, I know we’re here to kill the fog goblins and nothing more, . But this coffee…this coffee is…

“Max this coffee is better than the we had last chapter, and I’m so sorry for having to say that, but it is, it is, it

“No, Libby, you’re right,” I said in understanding. “It better, and I’m not hurt in the slightest by your saying that. How can I possibly compare to ” I asked as I pointed at the coffee.

“That doesn’t make you angry?” she asked me.

“No,” I said firmly. “Hell, I’m proud of you! You’re deeply committed to honesty, and I respect that about you Don’t ever change.”

In response, she signaled to the goblins that she wanted another refill.

I did as well.

Coffee shouldn’t be this good. Coffee should be this good. How could something this wonderful exist in nature? There had to be a trick to it! But what? No…no. The universe was surely filled with many delightful mysteries. A wise man once told me that if you ever want to enjoy the taste of pork, don’t watch how sausage is made.

I didn’t need to understand how this incredible brew came to be. I didn’t need to know the secrets behind its creation. I just needed to know that it existed and that I was drinking it and that everything was in this world. Just

And that was when Libby made a fateful discovery.

“Max…” she whispered. “Max, they have sugar cubes!”

“What?” I asked her in stunned disbelief.

“They have she repeated while pointing at a little porcelain bowl on the serving tray that was filled with little white square lumps.

My GOD, she was right!

“Oh, no fucking way!” I exclaimed. “It was good straight out of the kettle? Oh, there is no way in HELL we aren’t trying this out with sugar!”

“But Max! Thus far it’s been so perfect! What if by adding sugar, we ruin the flavor? That could forever taint our memories of this perfect coffee on this perfect day! I can’t do it!”

“You’re wrong, Libby! We’re . No, more than that, we’re We can’t be afraid to try new things. And we can’t be afraid of failure either! That’s not the life we chose for ourselves! Do it, Libby!

“Oh God, Max! I'm afraid!” she whimpered.

“I’m right here with you, girl! Max and Libby, against the world! Libby and Max, friends forever!”

Libby reached over our cups and dropped a single cube of sugar into each.

Silently, we both stirred our drinks.

“Maaaax….”

“We’ll go at the same time. On the count of three!”

“What if we’re making a mistake?”

“And what if we aren’t? We’ll never know unless we try!”

We each held up our cups.

“One…two…THREE!”

We downed our drinks.

It was AMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAZING!

“Max! Max! It’s so good! It’s so fucking ” Libby screamed.

“LIBBY! I understand I am with everything! This is like the quickening!”

“The what?”

“The quickening!”

“What’s the quickening?”

“The prize all the immortals fight over in Highlander! They all want to decapitate each other and take all the quickenings to learn everything about everything!”

“Can’t they just get jobs in research?” she asked me.

“No!” I replied. “It’s much faster when they cut each other’s heads off!”

“That’s fucking stupid!” she snorted.

“ fucking stupid!” I replied.

“Say that to my face!” she demanded.

“I don’t want to! You’re scary!”

“Max, I don’t ever want to stop drinking this coffee. I thought I was complete as an individual before, but now I know what a childish self-deceit that was.”

“Libby, there’s me drinking this coffee, and then there’s a future where I’m not drinking this coffee, and I already know which reality I want to live in!”

“We’ll stay here!” declared Libby. “We’ll live peacefully alongside the bean goblins in natural harmony. We’ll slowly teach them the ways of civilization and elevate their culture, and in exchange we’ll never go without this coffee again! Then life will be perfect and nothing bad will ever happen to anyone ever again!”

“You’re so smart,” I wept. “You’re so fucking smart! I wish I was as-as smart as you! Because you’re so smart!”

“I smart, Max! But you’re good at things too. Really!”

“I am? What am I good at?”

“I’ve seen you kill a lot of stuff! You’re like good at killing things! If killing were political prestige, you’d be the president’s prime minister!”

“Oh my god, Libby! I’ve thought my voice should be obeyed by the masses! My first decree would be to ban American kids from getting K-pop haircuts! We don’t have the facial structure for it, America! Our jaws are too wide! It’s like French anime! Why the fuck would watch French anime?”

“I’m sure they do just as good a job as anyone else, Max.”“You wouldn’t say that with a straight face if your niece ever made you watch with her!”

“Deep cut, Max!”

“Not if you’re Canadian!”

We sat there quietly drinking our perfect coffee. We’d nearly finished it all off when a bean goblin approached with a fresh kettle.

“They brought more!” Libby purred happily.

“Yeah…yeah, they did,” I said.

What was this unfamiliar sensation slowly overtaking me?

Was this…unease?

“Max, what’s wrong? Pour up! This is a happy moment!” Libby said cheerfully as she reached forth to replenish her cup.

“Libby…this is really good coffee,” I said.

“Agreed!”

“Libby…is it good?” I asked her.

“What? No. Ha, no! No, no, no! There’s no such thing as coffee that’s too good!” Libby said, as she fiercely shook her head. “No, this is everything as it should be. This is where we’re meant to be, Max. This is our place in the world.”

“Drinking coffee?”

“Drinking Libby crooned before taking another swallow.

“Libby, is this as good as life gets?” I asked.

“Fuck yeah!”

“ This is as good as life gets?”

“The coffee is good, Max. All we need is the coffee,” she insisted.

“The coffee good,” I agreed. “But is the coffee Is it the sum of all joy? Is it truly the pinnacle?”

Libby paused and stared at her cup. Her expression was now filled with suspicion and not a small amount of hostility. “What are you saying?”

“I think we need to stop drinking the coffee.”

“But the coffee is

“Libby! The coffee might be good…but is it good for

Libby scrambled to her feet and pointed an accusing finger at me, a finger that now trembled with barely controlled anger.

“I’m not giving up this coffee, Max,” she said flatly.

“The coffee is controlling us,” I told her. “The coffee is good!”

“We it! Aren’t you the one always saying we’re heroes?” she yelled.

“It’s too fine a reward!” I yelled back. “With coffee this good, what’s the point of ever doing anything else? What achievement could compare? What reward could possibly sate us after today? This coffee is a curse!”

“It is NOT!”

“It is! Nothing this good can possibly last forever! Also, I’m feeling really jittery right now! Aren’t you?”

“Well, I mean, yes…but... wait, stop, Max what are you doing?”

“WHAT I HAVE TO!” I cried out. I lifted the kettle and hurled it away!

“MAX! MAX, NO!” Libby shrieked in panic. She attempted to chase after it, but I grabbed her from behind and refused to let go.

“No! No! Nooooooo! Why, Max? she sobbed. “You really are a monster!”

“You don’t think I want to go after it too?” I said between my tears. “You don’t think this is killing me? I loved that coffee, Libs! I LOVED IT! But can’t you see the harm it was doing to us? Can’t you see what we were doing to The coffee was good, Libby! The coffee was

“It was good! It was so good…” Libby whispered.

We clung to each other and slowly sank to the ground, weeping in misery over our loss.

“Are we going to be okay, Max?” Libby asked me after a few minutes had passed.

“I don’t know…I just don’t know…” I whispered back.

“They brought us another pot,” she said.

“I saw that.”

“I really want some more.”

“So do I, but I mean, we just hurl the last one away only a few minutes ago. Has it been long enough?”

“I want to say…yes?” she said.

“Oh, well, okay then. Asked and answered!”

I reached over and poured a fresh cup.

We’d get those fog goblins in a bit.

Seriously!

Damn, this was good coffee.

The slaughter will definitely commence when we get around to it!

Maybe tomorrow?